Heist Society

Heist Society - 12th September 2019

Tonight‘s show for NODA was a self written piece called Heist Society, written, directed and produced by Laura Nixon and Charlie Hinckley. This is a production by the young RATS (Ribchester Amateur Theatre Society). I have to say that this small village amateur dramatic society really enjoyed themselves in this production. The production has been put on with just seven weeks rehearsal and I have to say it is a credit to the directors and the skills as a script writing team of both Charlie and Laura with the production that they have pulled off tonight. 

I was invited to the opening night of this show run. It is all centred around a very interesting story line with an evil billionaire and a poor small village that is to be bulldozed and turned into Waitrose! 

Special mention has to go to some of the Lead Performers in this production. Nell Johnson as Anne giving fantastically natural and believable performance Joseph Robinson as Kevin that would be actor but in the end came good. Dora green who played Jennifer the yoga loving villager who would do anything for her friends was a delight to watch and stole the show for me with her Mission Impossible style laser scene - inspired idea! Grace Talbot, the very funny Margaret, the 68-year-old feisty granny with a past was played very well and a real crowd favourite.  Sam Soper who played Raymond the International art thief was fantastic and had a great character - his timing was absolutely spot-on good job well done. I would also like to mention Jack Talbot in the lead role of the billionaire Pinkerton. His character was obnoxious, but lovable and had the audience in stitches whenever he was on stage. His wife Felicity, played by Rachel Flanagan was a fantastic betrayal of an evil billionaires. The Normans, Norman & Pnorman, played by Zac Royal and Seth Barrett were great supporting roles with some great one liners and some lovely character acting. Big bad Steve played by James Talbot again portrayed a fantastic character and had some funny lines with the audience laughing along. Nigel the Monkey was played by Olivia Soper  - a lovable unfortunate monkey that lived in the vent (don’t ask ) was such a lovely portrayal of a guard monkey - I think! :-) well done, Olivia.

The performances of all the main characters have been clearly well drilled and well rehearsed. Hats off to the directing team to making sure the lines were secure and characters are on-point. Every character started and ended in exactly the same way and they held the strong characterisations throughout the whole piece. Comedy is a very difficult genre of theatre to perform well especially for young performers without it turning silly, but I haven’t laughed out loud like I have this evening for a while and they absolutely nailed the performance. There has clearly been a lot of work done on character timing and comedy and I have to say it is one of my most enjoyable performances that I’ve seen this year. 

This young team write, direct and produce all by themselves. They are all young performers and it is not run by adults at all. To say it is of a high calibre is an understatement. There were a couple of technical issues that paled into insignificance during the performance. A couple of straight lines on stage and some slight issue with blocking in the second act I feel have to be mentioned purely and simply to give a balance to the review. The audience was full and this group is clearly well supported in the local village.  Ribchester amateur theatre society clearly have a very strong following and have been performing for years with many ex-performers returning to support and work within the production team. The choreography by Frances Lamburn was great and used everybody on stage, some lovely group numbers including the finale. The set and scenery was simple, but effective - well done Colin Hinckley - This made for some very slick scene changes. The lighting and sound also controlled by the directors Chalie and Laura went off perfectly with some really nice effects.

A small cast of 18 performed this show and they should all be very proud of themselves. I have greatly enjoyed my first visit to Ribchester and enjoyed my first RATS performance.  I very much look forward to coming to another performance very soon - congratulations to everybody involved and I hope you enjoy the rest of your run.

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